Saturday, 10 November 2018

President Emmerson Mnangagwa has proposed an indaba on how
Zimbabwe should develop value chains for the country’s mining and agriculture
sectors with a view to advancing the twin objectives of modernising and
industrialising the economy within 12 years.

Such a meeting, he said, would be in sync with the
trajectory taken by industrialised nations.

The Head of State and Government said this would counter
the “resource curse” and “development paradox” afflicting African countries
that are rich in resources but plagued by poverty.

In his weekly column in The Sunday Mail, President
Mnangagwa said it was time Zimbabwe started the journey of developing value
chains necessary for establishment of an upper middle-income income economy by
2030.

“My own view is that the task of mobilising and organising
national knowledge and skills in order to embark on a national exercise of
mapping critical value chains for our development strategy is an urgent task
worth pursuing.

“Could convening a Presidential Summit or Conference on
Value Chains be the answer?” posed the President.

“Countries in our region, most notably South Africa, have
done such an exercise. So, too, have countries in Asia which have
industrialised. The decision to embark on such a course in Sadc was taken a few
years ago at an Extraordinary Summit held in Victoria Falls.

“We now need to isolate each mineral, and each agricultural
product —one by one – in order to map out strands of value chains by which we
transform our economy. Time has now come for us to make a start,” he said.

President Mnangagwa said Zimbabwe — like most African
countries — had the dubious distinction of failing to exploit its natural
resource wealth despite being highly mineralised.

Where production was taking place, he noted, the country
was not deriving maximum possible value as minerals and agricultural produce
was being exported either in raw form or semi-processed.

On the other hand, Japan posseses no iron ore but accounts
for more than 10 percent of global steel supply. India and Europe produce very
little gold but are responsible for nearly 40 percent of its beneficiation.

South Africa and Zimbabwe have 80 percent of the world’s
platinum output but most of it is beneficiated in Japan, Europe and North
America.

China, the US, Israel, Belgium and India beneficiate
virtually all the world’s diamonds without mining a single carat at home.

President Mnangagwa said, “In agriculture for instance,
Zimbabwe adds value and beneficiates locally only 30 percent of the cotton she
produces. The rest goes abroad as raw cotton exports. Our textile industry is
not just small; it is ailing.

“The story of tobacco is worse, with the country only able
to process about two percent out of the more than 240 million kilogrammes it
produced this last season. The rest goes out raw, with our tasty leaf being
used as a blend for global brands.

“The story of soya and wheat is even more disheartening.
There we have some processing capacity. Yet the country has not been able to
produce enough of both as feedstock for this industrial capacity!

“We have tended to process what we cannot produce, even
though we have everything necessary for that production,” said the President.

“Equally, we produce top-notch beef but have no leather and
tanning industry to talk about. Countries like Ethiopia have a buoyant leather
industry which exports to the rest of the world.

“In respect of minerals, we have almost all the minerals
that drive world industries, but we have either not mined them, or mined them
modestly.

“Certainly we have not processed them at all. This is what
others have called ‘the resource curse’ of Africa, which Zimbabwe has not
escaped.”

A holistic value chain for the mining sector would
encompass the actual digging of minerals processing, refining, fabrication and
marketing.

President Mnangagwa said creating such value chains
required synergies with Diasporan Zimbabweans and investment in research,
development and innovation. Sunday Mail